AN: Hey friends! This isn't the story I set out to write, but don't worry! That one will be up, too! I just need to see the promo for 5x11 first. :D So please, enjoy this, and let me know if you want a second chapter about Kensi leaving!
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
Those were the last words I said to him. By now, the static had been constant in my ear for over two minutes.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
But the thing is, sometimes a knife isn't just a knife. I was scared—scared in a way that I'd never been before. Because my walls were useless against Deeks. They might as well be made of glass with how easily he shattered them.
"He's been dark for awhile," Callen's voice snapped me out of my trance.
"We knew this building had problems," Sam responded rationally. But it wasn't Sam's partner inside. No, it wasn't Sam's wife inside.
That's a more accurate analogy, I decided.
I pressed my hand to my coms, desperately trying to hear something—anything—that would tell me my partner was alive, or even that he needed my help. Anything.
But the static just continued. I decided, right then and there, that static was my new, least favorite sound in the world.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
Those were the last words I'd said to him. He could be dying in there, something could go horribly wrong, and those would be the last words he ever heard from me.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
But, then, sometimes a knife isn't just a knife. Sometimes it's my heart. And that was what I'd really given him.
Why couldn't I tell him that? I wondered. I was after him to say what he really means, but I can't do the same thing.
I will, I vowed. Sitting in the back seat of the SUV, worry clouding my mind and heart, I realized that our thing had to work. Because stopping it wasn't going to take away the feelings.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife. And sometimes it's my heart.
"Eric?" Callen called, breaking the silence.
"The signal's on full boost. There's nothing we can do," Eric's voice came through in my ear.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
Go.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
Go!
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
GO!
"Lotsa guns inside that place," Sam commented. My mind was still spinning, and my gut was telling me to get in there NOW. "We go in, we're going in big."
"Let's let it play out for another sixty seconds," Callen decided. "Then we breach."
No!
Something inside me was telling me I needed to get in there as soon as possible.
"Clear?" he asked, looking back at me.
I opened my mouth to respond the way I should. Nothing came out.
"Kensi?" Sam said, a note of warning in his voice. I turned my head toward the sound, but still nothing would come out of my mouth.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
I fought it for another moment before I couldn't ignore it any longer. I shook my head at myself, opened the door, and bolted across the street before I'd even processed what I was doing.
I was so focused on getting to Deeks that I didn't even know Sam and Callen had followed me until I heard Sam shout,
"Federal Agents!" and shoot a man behind me.
I didn't stop, I didn't turn, and I didn't even think. I just pressed forward, recalling the blueprints from memory. I was in the fatal funnel, when I couldn't stop myself anymore.
"Deeks!"
I heard a gun shot from behind a half-open, and immediately my mind went to the worst-case scenario. I kicked open the door and shot the man on the inside.
As I turned my head, looking for my partner, I felt a bullet whiz by my head. I instinctively followed it and saw hit a woman behind me who held a gun, still pointed at my head.
I looked back and saw my saw my partner, hand on a gun that was still in the hands of a dead man. I looked back at the wall, then to my partner again.
"Are you crazy?" I asked, but I couldn't keep the relief out of my voice. "You almost took my head off! Who takes that shot?"
But what I really meant was, You took the shot.
It meant there was still hope for us. We could be partners and still have our… thing.
He just sent me a terse look and said, "Took you long enough."
His voice was slightly hard, and I couldn't blame him. I was so overwhelmed with my emotions at the moment that I sure I was sending out crazy mixed signals. This morning I was yelling at him for not taking the shot, and here I was now, yelling at him for taking the shot.
He walked over to the man, who I now noticed was hanging from a meat hook.
"Stay with me Thappa." And then he was out the door with Thappa in a fireman's carry, and Sam and Callen were entering, giving me knowing, slightly reproachful looks.
I sighed, knowing what was coming.
"I owe you guys an apology," I said, trying to cut off the lecture before it could begin. "Sorry."
But really, I wasn't. I'd do it again in a heartbeat.
"Tell me you secured that thumb drive, we're gonna forget about it," Callen said.
Damn it, the thumb drive!
I'd completely forgotten about the thumb drive in my worry over Deeks's safety. I felt a new panic well in my chest, and it spilled over into babble.
"I don't have it."
"Well, who has it?" Sam asked, looking frustrated. "Deeks?"
"Um, no. I mean, he would have said if he had it, right? But I—" I paused to pull myself together. "Okay, there's no way the Gerk held on to it, so it's gotta be here somewhere. I will find it," I said, leaning down to search the man who's gun Deeks had just fired.
While I searched, my mind went wild.
If I can't find the thumb drive, will Callen split Deeks and me up? Will Deeks forgive me for this morning? Can I really talk about our thing? How am I going to—
"Kensi?" Sam's voice cut through my hectic thoughts. I looked up and stopped looking through the dead man's jacket. Sam waved a thumb drive. "Apology accepted."
I sighed in relief. Everything had worked out, and I'd have the chance to talk to Deeks.
My intentions must have shown on my face, because Callen nodded at me.
"Go be with your partner," he said. I didn't need to be told twice. I immediately unstrapped my gun and walked out the door. When I exited the shop, I saw my partner standing by the back of the ambulance.
I squared my shoulders and walked towards him. When he saw me, he walked toward me.
"He lost a lotta blood, but he'll live. Gherkas, believe the hype."
I smiled at this, and took a deep breath.
"Deeks, I—"
"I'm gonna go with him to the hospital," he cut me off, looking away from me, and turning to walk away.
"No! Hey, whoa, whoa wait!" I said, grabbing his arm and turning him around to face me. I could see in his eyes that he was dreading whatever he thought I was going to say.
He thinks I'll blame him for my reaction, I realized. I couldn't let him go without saying what I really meant, no matter how hard it was.
"Let me just—I just wanna tell you something."
Now he really looked panicked. I smiled as I realized that what I was about to say was going to surprise him.
"Yeah?" he asked, shifting back and forth, not meeting my gaze directly.
"We're gonna figure this out."
He froze, not expecting that to come from me. I didn't blame him, but I couldn't think about my past miscommunications. Right now, I just pushed ahead.
"All we gotta do is talk about it," I continued, smiling at him.
He smiled back. "Okay, but you don't really like talking about it."
"Well, yeah, but I promise I'll be better at talking about this," I reassured him quickly. My voice sounded slightly desperate, even to my ears.
His smile was cocky and contagious and disarming, and I knew what was coming.
"What do you mean by this?"
I knew it was coming, and I took a deep breath.
I can do this.
"This…" I said significantly, nodding my head for him to fill in the blank. When he didn't nod, or give any indication, I continued, "You know…"
"This thing?" he asked, a slightly cocky, slightly amused, slightly elated half smile on his face.
This was it. This was my moment of truth. I looked down. I looked at the ambulance. I looked everywhere but at Deeks.
"Yes…" I said, dragging out the word.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife.
Those couldn't be the only words I ever said about it. I had to get this out.
"Our… thing."
When I finally looked up at him, he was full on grinning.
"I'm sorry," he said, not sounding sorry at all. "I just, I didn't hear you because there were so many people walking by. If you could maybe say it again… louder. Just for me. Just once, just say it for me."
I looked at him and shook my head, affection making my voice soft.
"I hate you." I love you.
It was as close to the words as I could say at the moment.
His answering grin and chuckle told me he knew what I really meant.
"You don't," he said grinning and shaking his head with a mischievous glint in his ocean blue eyes. "You don't. You don't hate me."
I could see in his eyes, the flash backs to last night.
"Our thing," I repeated, stronger this time. Saying it again didn't feel strange. It wasn't hard or forced. It was right.
"Wow," he whispered reverently. I was expecting some quip about how he'd like to record that and use it as his ringtone, but he just rocked back on his heels. I could tell that my words had hit him in his core, and he knew what I meant.
His answering look said more than any words could have.
"You have to promise me something, too though," I continued.
"Anything," he said, without hesitation.
I smiled at that.
"Promise you'll be patient with me?" I asked, hating the twinge of uncertainty that I heard in my own voice.
His eyes immediately erased all doubt, though. He opened his mouth to speak, but the ambulance driver came up to us.
"Yo, gotta roll."
"See you tonight?" I asked, trying not to sound desperate, but the thought of a night without him was already… undesirable to say the least.
Besides, I want that ice cream, I told myself. I smiled as I immediately heard in my mind all the quips Deeks would come up with about dessert.
"Yeah," his heartfelt agreement snapped me out of it, and I could tell he meant it for more than just tonight.
He walked toward the ambulance, and I couldn't help but watch him. Before he got in, he tuned and called back to me,
"Can you do me a… favor, Fern?"
"Anything," I responded immediately. Then slightly regretted it at the look on his face.
"Can you burn that shirt for me?" he asked. I closed my eyes against the emotions that threatened to overwhelm me and smiled.
That was my partner, being patient. He was lightening the mood, telling me that he'd always be the Deeks I would always need.
I nodded infinitesimally, and he grinned back at me.
Sometimes a knife is just a knife. But sometimes it's more.
