Okay so this is my first one-shot. It is set after the season finale and about two months after the team returned to Los Angeles. I hope you like it. Rated M just to be on the safe side.
Callen opened his eyes, slowly taking in the scene around him. He was cuffed to a metal pole, as were Sam, Kensi, Deeks, Eric, and Nell. They seemed to be in some sort of a warehouse. "How the hell did we get here?"Callen thought. To his left, Sam was also starting to regain consciousness.
…
Five hours earlier:
It was a slow day at the office for the NCIS team. There were no open cases so the team had decided to play a little hand to hand in the gym. Sam and Kensi were dominating, as usual. As Nell videotaped each fight, Eric would load the video into his computer and, using a program that he created, calculate the next best move.
"Come on Deeks! Is that all you got?" Kensi challenged as she pinned him to the ground.
Unbeknownst to the team, a gas was seeping through the AC vents and into the gym. Deeks was the first to notice that something was wrong, complaining that he had a headache and felt like he was going to pass out.
The rest of the team had just believed he was being a baby and trying to get out of round three with Kensi. Within ten minutes, the team was unconscious and being carried into vans.
….
"Ugh." Sam groaned. "What the fuck happened?" This sudden noise seemed to cause Deeks and Kensi to force their eyes open.
"Where are we?" Deeks questioned, still somewhat groggy.
"Nell! Eric!" Callen yelled, causing the pair to sit up. Nell immediately noticed the cuffs that bound her to the metal pole, a look of terror crossed her face. Eric just looked confused.
Just then, a large metal door slammed open and in walked a tall man dressed in a black Armani suit, followed by two built men.
"Ah, I am so glad to see that you are all awake." The man said with an accent that Callen easily recognized as Haitian. "My apology for drugging you earlier but it was the only way that I could get you all in one place."
"What do you want?" Callen jeered, his voice full of venom.
"Well Agent Callen, that is very simple. I want to know where Henrietta Lange is."
"Go to hell." Callen spat. The mysterious man signaled for one of his thugs to step forward. "Charlie." The short man raised his gun and shot Callen twice in the leg without hesitation. Callen immediately cried out in pain and reeled backwards.
"You see agents; this is what will happen if you do not answer my question. I do not wish to be violent but if you refuse to talk, this will be the outcome."
"We aren't going to tell you anything." Sam said, only briefly taking his eyes off of his wounded partner.
"Trevor." The tall man called out. Trevor placed a cigarette lighter to Sam's face. The agent jumped as the flame made contact. Tears formed in Kensi's eyes as she saw the angry red mark that the lighter had left.
"I am going to leave now. But I will be back in one hour. If you tell me where she is, no one else gets hurt. If you don't, well, let's just say that Ms. Jones will be in quite a bit of pain.
….In a small Italian café sat Hetty Lange, sipping a cappuccino and observing the pedestrians that walked around her. Out of the corner of her eye, Hetty saw her cell phone light up. It was Vance. Not wanting to ruin her afternoon, Hetty let the next four calls go to voicemail. Finally, on the fifth time, Hetty relented and took the call.
"Leon." Hetty said in a warning tone.
"Hetty, the team is in trouble."
That was all it took for Hetty to journey back to Los Angeles. She wasn't ever going to go back but whoever had her agents, yes they would always be her agents, knew that she would never abandon them.
….
The hour that passed, seemed like an eternity to the crestfallen agents. As the door opened, Nell cringed in fear. They had talked about what she would do. Like Eric, Nell knew nothing about Hetty's whereabouts. She was terrified but if being hurt was what it would take to keep Hetty safe, then she would suck it up.
As Nell was dragged out of the room, she gave Eric one last glance. The look in her eyes said it all. She couldn't tell Callen, or Sam, or Kensi, or Deeks, they were used to danger and pain, but Eric and Nell weren't. She was scared.
Just a few minutes later, Nell's desperate cries could be heard coming from a room across from the one where the team was being kept. After about ten minutes of listening to Nell's screams, Kensi couldn't take it anymore.
"Stop!" Kensi screamed. "She doesn't know anything! Leave her alone!"
The sound of a gunshot made the room fall silent. The absence of Nell's screams left an eerie silence in the warehouse. Seconds later, the men came back into the room and dumped Nell's lifeless body onto the floor.
"Oh God." Eric gasped.
"Why?"Kensi cried. "Why would you do that?"
"You said she didn't know anything so we shot her." The tall man said before walking out.
Kensi blanched "Oh my god. It was my fault."
"No Kens. It wasn't your fault. You had no way of knowing…"Deeks trailed off
"Kensi, its better this way." Callen said sadly. "Nell couldn't have dealt with this much pain."
Their conversation ended when their captor walked back into the room. "So, who wants to go next?" the man asked, a huge smile on his face.
"You monster!" Kensi screamed. "You killed her!"
"Ah Miss Blye, I will take that as you volunteering."
Deeks immediately spoke up. "No, take me next."
"All in good time Detective Deeks." The man turned to leave with Kensi but seemed to reconsider. "Why don't you all watch?"
Out of nowhere, a golf club made contact with Kensi's ribcage. Kensi screamed and then proceeded to cough up blood. Callen was enraged and Deeks just looked helpless.
"Kens…" he whispered. Another blow, this time to her right leg. It continued like this until Kensi was unconscious. She was cuffed back to the pole, her head hanging at an awkward angle.
"Now Detective, it's your turn."
Deeks was glad that Kensi couldn't see this. All of a sudden, a sharp pain in his back drew Deeks' attention back to the present. Deeks couldn't see what the men behind him were doing, but he saw the horror in Sam and Callen's eyes. Eric still had his head buried in his knees. More pain as some sort of acid was poured on the stab wound. This pattern continued for an hour. When Deeks was finally cuffed back to the pole, he let his head rest against the cold metal, a soft cry escaping from his mouth.
Eric was next. Eric knew he was next. Eric had spent the past three hours wondering what they were going to do to him. When he was finally pulled from his place in the corner his eyes rested on Nell's lifeless body. Callen was right, she had been lucky. When Eric saw the golf clubs, he was relieved. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad. Maybe he was wrong. Thirty minutes later, Eric's legs were shattered. In those moments, Eric resented Callen and Sam for not divulging information on Hetty. He was sure that they knew something, anything to get them out of this mess.
Callen was slowly losing his mind. For the past nine hours, he had watched his friends, his partners, suffer through excruciating pain. The bullet wound in his leg was now infected and he was pretty sure that he had a fever. Sam couldn't talk or move his face because the skin stretching over the burn was unbearable. Nell was dead. Kensi was still unconscious. Deeks was trying his best not to cry when the cold metal rubbed against his acid-filled wounds. Eric's legs were bent at an unnatural angle.
They were in bad shape and the worst part was that Callen saw no way out of this.
Little did Callen know that Hetty was now back in Los Angeles. She had been contacted by the team's captor. She was getting ready to make an exchange. Herself for the team. She could only hope that there was a team left.
…
When the tall man entered the room again, Callen readied himself for round two. Instead, they were all uncuffed.
"You may leave." One of the men said.
Callen didn't bother to question this statement. He scooped up Nell's body in his arms and motioned for Sam to help Eric. Deeks steadied a now conscious Kensi. They all walked out of the warehouse to find a black Escalade with the keys inside. At any moment, Callen expected to feel the all too familiar sound of a gunshot, but there was nothing.
Callen wasted no time in pulling out of the abandoned lot and headed for the hospital. Sam, who was seated next to him, used a conspicuously placed cell phone to call Vance.
"I will meet you at St. Ann's" was all that the director said.
Once at the hospital , each of the agents was taken into surgery for their injuries. Three days later, Callen was the first to be discharged. Vance was waiting for him in the waiting room where Callen had chosen to stay until his team was ready to leave with him.
"What happened? Why did they just let us go? Callen questioned.
"Hetty turned herself in, Callen."
"No…." was all Callen could manage to say. "Is she….?"
"NCIS recovered her body two days ago. It was the only way to save the people she cared for most."
Hetty couldn't be dead, she just couldn't. For the first time in Callen's life, the agent didn't know how his life could ever be the same.
A week later, as the team stood in a cemetery, the reality had not yet set in. They had just buried Nell, sweet innocent Nell. Eric looked at the casket as if he expected her to somehow come back and tell them that this had all been a joke.
Hetty had chosen to be cremated. Callen spread her ashes in the garden that she had started at NCIS. On the drive home, Callen no longer had the strength to fight back the tears. In the past week his life had been torn apart. He didn't know how the team could ever be the same because putting the pieces back would not be easy.
As Callen opened the front door to his house, a house that Hetty had given him, he saw a small tan envelope on the floor. Inside was a letter.
My Dear,
This is a letter I knew that someday, I would be compelled to write. Please know that my decision was an easy one to make. I have lived my life and now I will gladly give it up. You on the other hand, are just beginning yours. Your past does not define you Mr. Callen, but the people around you and the choices you make will determine your legacy. I love you dearly.
"There is a way to look at the past. Don't hide from it. It will not catch you–if you don't repeat it."-Anonymous
Your mother.
I hope you liked this. I got the idea from the season finale and I was wondering what it would take for Hetty to come back. Please review!