AN: Gotta love weekends that allow time to post two chapters! That said, the next chapter probably won't be up until Wednesday. Thanks again for all the reviews, follows, and favorites.

Spoilers: Up through season 7 and including spoilers for season 8. This is speculation on the storyline that will cover Daniela Ruah's maternity leave.

Disclaimer: Not mine (not even the DVDs, which I borrowed from the library this summer), not making any money from this.

Ten days after being impaled in a helicopter crash, Kensi was released from the hospital. What should have been a happy occasion was overshadowed by the fact that she might have an even bigger ordeal in front of her.

For the moment, until they knew if the aplastic anemia was here to stay, Dr. Popa insisted on restricting Kensi's activities as if it was. While her blood levels were at the low end of normal now, she wouldn't know until her next blood tests came back if they remained there. And in the event that they dropped in the meantime, it was better to be safe than sorry.

Right now Kensi was enjoying basking in Monty's joy at seeing her again. Kensi wanted to spend some time outside in the nice weather, breathing in fresh air after spending the better part of two weeks in hospitals. She, Deeks, and their favorite canine were in their small backyard playing fetch with a tennis ball. They sat on comfy patio chairs, side by side, close enough for Deeks to lean over periodically and bump her arm with his, hold her hand, or kiss her sweetly on the lips.

Kensi had wanted to take the pooch to the beach or the park to play Frisbee, but Deeks had vetoed that idea. The fewer people she was around right now, the less likely she would catch something. Even though she was on an antibiotic for her leg, Deeks reminded her there were all kinds of run-of-the-mill viruses she still needed to avoid.

Deeks' mother was due to visit later in the afternoon. She wanted to come by while Kensi was in the hospital, but was on the tail end of a cold, so they didn't want to take the chance. Instead, they promised her the honor of the first visit when Kensi was released. In exchange, Roberta promised to bring a pan of lasagna for them.

"I think I'm going to call Hetty and tell her I can't come in tomorrow." Deeks had had a quick follow up appointment with an orthopedist while Kensi was waiting for her discharge paperwork that morning, and had been cleared for fieldwork.

"Deeks, you need to go back to work. You heard Nell when she called yesterday, field operations have basically been suspended with me, you, and Sam being sidelined. Callen's practically out of his mind not being able to go out in the field."

"Right, and Nell's not really available to partner with Callen because her focus is on the mole right now."

"Besides, you need to save your PTO hours in case we're looking at a worst case scenario with me. There might be a lot of doctors' visits you'll want to be at." Kensi glanced at Deeks and could tell he wasn't convinced, despite the fact that they had already discussed it on the way home this morning. "C'mon, it'll feel good to get back in the game after a week-and-a-half of being cooped up in hospitals with me."

"No, what will feel good is being back at work with my partner." He turned his head and leaned in slightly to kiss her.

"And there's no place your partner would rather be." She kissed him back. "But you've managed without me before."

"At least this time I'll know where you are."

"And get to come home to me every day."

"Hopefully your blood tests continue to come back normal and this will only last as long as it takes for your leg to heal."

"Which reminds me, I need to ask Dr. Popa if I can be cleared for desk duty in the meantime."

"Yeah, because that wouldn't drive you insane."

"It's got to be better than sitting around the house all day."

"But think of all the train-wreck TV you could watch!"

"Uh-huh, as I slowly balloon to 300 pounds working through every Twinkie, donut, and quart of rocky road I can get my hands on. No, thanks. I'm sure I can be useful at ops."

"I'm sure Eric wouldn't mind having you there to rub his shoulder again." Deeks winked and Kensi rolled her eyes. "Although, he might have been onto something. You could be our own personal masseuse! You know, we come back from a day of chasing baddies, maybe I have a kink in my neck, and you could work it out for me."

"You realize I'd have to provide the same services for everyone, right?"

"Yes. But only I'd get the happy ending…of getting to go home with you." He winked at the look on her face. "Get your mind out of the gutter, Fern."

"Speaking of happy endings, are you going to the drug store later?"

Somewhat confused by Kensi's statement, Deeks replied slowly, "Yeah, I was thinking of going after my mother gets here. I need to fill your prescriptions and pick up bandages and tape for your leg."

"You can skip the painkiller; it makes me groggy. Just make sure we have plenty of Tylenol and Advil, please. Most important, though, make sure we have condoms since I haven't been on the Pill since the crash."

"Ah, yes, now I get the happy ending/drug store connection." Deeks smiled broadly. "One of the only physical activities that's not restricted. Unless of course we were really going to get that trampoline…"

Kensi let out a small laugh. "The trampoline will have to wait. But I will not. I want to have sex with my boyfriend tonight."

"Tonight?" he whined. "We have to wait until tonight?"

"Well, your mother is coming by in a few hours, so if you want to run to the pharmacy now, I'm sure we'll have some time before she gets here."

"Yeah? You'll be okay by yourself?"

"First, I'm not an invalid; I'm on crutches. And tomorrow I'm allowed to start putting some weight on my leg, so I probably won't even need both crutches soon. And second, Monty's here. He'll have my back while you're gone."

"And then I'll have your back, and your front, and your top, and your bottom." Deeks kissed Kensi on the cheek as he stood from the chair.

Kensi laughed, a real one this time. "Go, perv. And hurry up. If you and your mom don't wear me out too much this afternoon, maybe we can even have an encore tonight."

"I'm going to try to pretend you didn't just mention me and my mother in the same sentence as sex."

She threw Monty's ball at him as he headed toward the house.

"Want to place a bet on how many more times Claudia there is going to touch Callen's arm before she invites him back to her place for a little afternoon delight?" Deeks asked.

"She is a little touchy-feely, isn't she? And it's Claudia." Nell pronounced the name with an intonation so that it sounded like 'cloud-eeya.'

The detective and the analyst were in the SRX keeping a discrete eye on Callen, who was across the street at an open air café with gorgeous Portuguese national who they hoped would lead them to the Marine they believed was selling intel about current missions. He probably wasn't the mole, but might be a connection to him or her.

Deeks had been back at work for three weeks. Much, but not all, of that time was spent trying to get a handle on who else in NCIS was a traitor.

"Touché. And nice accent. Kensi would be proud. Although she probably would have given you a couple of tips about your use of open-syllabic organization or trochaic speech patterning."

Nell smiled, at both the compliment and the reference to Kensi's skill with languages and willingness to help Nell improve hers. "Thanks. I caught up with her for a few minutes by phone yesterday. She said she's good."

"Yeah, she's good." Deeks nodded but didn't make eye contact with his diminutive temporary partner.

"Wow, either I'm getting really good at spotting lies, or you two are getting really bad at telling them." When he didn't respond, Nell pushed. "Seriously Deeks, how is she doing?"

Deeks let out a sigh. They hadn't been sharing all the gory details with the team, because there was so much information to take in that by the time he and Kensi had processed it together or separately, they really didn't feel like talking about it for a while. "I'm pretty sure you're up to date on the medical end of things, at least the broad strokes. After that first week out of the hospital we found out that Kensi's bone marrow has, in fact, failed, and her doctor skipped right over the first usual course of treatment for aplastic anemia and went straight to the next one."

"Why'd she do that?"

"Aplastic anemia, or AA, to those of us in the know, is typically an autoimmune disease. All of a sudden one day your body wakes up and starts attacking its own bone marrow, and poof! you've got AA. So they start you on immunosuppressive therapy to keep your t-cells from killing your bone marrow so it can go back to work. But Kensi's bone marrow was weakened, if not destroyed by the toxic fumes on the chopper, so dealing with her immune system like that won't help."

"What will help?" Nell was almost sorry she'd started the conversation. Deeks didn't sound like himself as he was sharing all this. He sounded tired, unhappy, and scared; definitely not qualities she usually ascribed to her favorite detective.

"Well, in the past two weeks, she had another transfusion of platelets, because it's always a good idea not to bleed out if you bump your head or something equally innocent. And she's also started taking growth factors to try to encourage platelet and white blood cell growth in whatever bone marrow may still be functioning. They're hormones that leave her nauseated and tired, give her headaches, and are starting to make her joints ache. Oh, and one is an injection…Kensi had to learn how to give herself a shot every day." He paused for a moment, "But on the positive side, her leg is healing nicely and she can walk on it for short distances without using a crutch."

"God, Deeks, I had no idea. I mean I know this is serious and things seem to always be changing, but..." she trailed off, not knowing what she wanted to say.

"Listening to myself just then, I don't know if it sounds more or less depressing than it actually is."

"It's got to be terrifying for both of you. I'm glad you told me. I really wish Kensi would have."

"Please don't take it personally, Nell. We kind of decided not to go into too much detail on a regular basis with you guys. Kensi doesn't want us distracted at work, and really, it's just such a freaking downer to talk about, you know?"

"I do now. How are you guys handling all of this, emotionally, I mean?"

Deeks chuckled and smiled for the first time since they started the surveillance. "Kensi's incredible. On good days, she gets up with me, takes Monty for a walk, then comes home and vacuums – for real! – or does laundry, or cleans the bathroom or kitchen before she needs to take a nap. You can tell the world has been turned on its axis if Kensi Marie Blye is so desperate for physical activity that she's cleaning nearly every day!" A real laugh escaped him this time. "Some days she goes to her mom's or my mom's for cooking lessons, and then she brings home whatever they made for us to have for dinner. Another sure sign of impending Armageddon."

"And on bad days?"

"On bad days she's too tired to do much more than eat cereal by noon. Or even vacuuming makes it hard to catch her breath, so she takes it easy. She likes to hang out in the backyard a lot lately."

"It sounds like she's trying to make the best of a bad situation." Nell said, hopefully.

"She's hating every minute of it. Because it's all just a reminder of what she's not allowed to do, as if the blood draws every few days and their resulting bruises aren't enough of a memento. She started badgering Hetty this week, asking if there's anything she can help with at the office."

"Maybe she should see someone, like a therapist. This has got to be a really hard adjustment for someone like Kensi." Nell tried to make the suggestion delicately, knowing Kensi was not typically the type of person who liked to talk about her feelings or ask for help.

Deeks nodded, "She does that already. Hetty contacted Nate, who gave Kensi the name of someone who understands our line of work and chronic illness."

"That's good. I'm really glad to hear that." Nell was quiet for several seconds before asking her next question. "How much longer is the treatment going to last? Kensi's always so vague when I ask her when she thinks she can come back to work."

Deeks glanced at Nell briefly, weighing how much to tell her just now. "There's the rub. This might be about as good as it gets for her. Ideally these meds and periodic transfusions ultimately raise and maintain her blood levels and she can try to live some semblance of a 'normal' life with some careful adjustments."

"But we don't live normal lives." Nell whispered sadly.

"No, we don't," Deeks agreed just as unhappily. "Which brings us to the nuclear option."

"Which is?"

"A bone marrow transplant. If the current course of treatment isn't effective, Kensi's best hope may be that a stranger who is a match to her in terms of blood antigens happens to be in the donor registry and is able and willing to donate his or her bone marrow. Of course, Kensi might decide this new 'lifestyle' just isn't doing it for her and opt to try the transplant route anyway. The good news is that a bone marrow transplant could actually cure her."

"That's great news!"

"Maybe. You ever heard that expression, 'If the disease doesn't kill you, the cure might.'? That's Kensi in a nutshell right now."

Kensi, meanwhile, was in her mother's kitchen helping to prepare meatloaf with potatoes au gratin and glazed carrots. Besides the cooking lessons giving her something to do, Kensi took on this Herculean task because there were many foodborne pathogens she wanted to avoid. The amount that she and Deeks typically ate out or brought in their meals made that difficult to control. Meat that was slightly undercooked or raw fruits and veggies that hadn't been washed properly might cause mild stomach upset to a healthy person, but it could kill an immunocompromised Kensi.

It also had the added benefit of allowing her to spend some time with her mom and Roberta. Deeks' mom had been beside herself with joy when Kensi asked if Roberta could show her how to make Deeks' favorite lasagna and anything else they thought Kensi could handle. Kensi had come to look forward to her visits with Roberta, as they often allowed her to hear stories of Deeks' misadventures as a child and adolescent. It also surprised Kensi that mother was more open than son about they abuse they'd suffered at the hands of Gordon John Brandel.

Julia was demonstrating the use of a mandolin to cut the potatoes to a consistent thickness. If she used the hand guard, Kensi could try it herself on the next potato since there would be very little chance that she would cut herself that way.

"Gee thanks, Mom. Way to make me feel like I'm twelve," Kensi commented mildly sarcastically.

"Someone whose blood doesn't clot properly because her body doesn't make enough platelets has no business using sharp implements otherwise."

Which is why Julia would only let Kensi watch when she used an actual knife to cut anything else. Kensi found it ironic that she was taking lessons on knife skills from anyone. Oh, the things she could teach her mother about other ways to use a knife!

Conversation focused mainly on instructions and technique until the meatloaf and potatoes were placed in the oven.

"How are you feeling today?" asked Julia, handing Kensi a mug of coffee as she sat down at the breakfast nook next to her daughter.

"The same: tired and achy. Glad I can walk without the crutch, though. I'm hoping to hear from my boss soon that they'll at least clear me for desk duty."

"Should you be doing that?"

"There's no reason not to," she shrugged. "It's good for me to be as active as I can, which isn't very active, really. I need to keep my body from getting used to doing nothing. If I'm doing that at work, at least some other good can come from it. No offense, but there's only so much cleaning and cooking I can do."

"Plus Marty can keep an eye on you. I'm sure he's not happy leaving you while he goes to work."

"That would actually help both of us. I find I'm not so good at being a cop's wife, so to speak. I'd much rather be at the office, so at least I'll know when to worry, instead of doing it the entire time he's gone like I do now."

Kensi's phone rang and she excused herself from the kitchen to take the call. She returned about ten minutes later, closing the small spiral notepad she carried with her to keep track of all the information she needed to manage now.

"Everything alright, honey? You look upset."

"Just more to think about. Who knew one illness could branch out into so many different areas?"

"What do you mean?"

Kensi paused, debating how much to share with her mother. While she didn't hide any of this from Deeks, she knew it upset him to hear some of it. Just like it would upset her mother. But hey, isn't that what mothers are for? She guessed she'd find out exactly how strong her relationship with Julia had become in the course of the next several months. They'd already grown closer in the past few weeks, for which Kensi was grateful.

"There are a lot of ways things can play out in the near future, and I'm trying to be ready to deal with the most likely ones. Like appointing Powers of Attorney, and preparing a will."

Julia did a decent job of hiding the fear in her eyes, but wasn't quick enough. "Is that really necessary? The will?"

Kensi sighed, "I should have had one long before now given what I do for a living, but I don't own much, and had no one to leave it to anyway. I just kept a handwritten note in my file at work stating my wishes. But now…" She took a breath, "Now I could be dead in a couple of years if we can't get this under control. And even though I still don't own much, there are people I love who I want to make sure have certain remembrances of me. Should worse come to worst, I don't want Deeks to deal with all of that on his own."

Julia studied her daughter for a few beats while both women tried to control their emotions. "I understand, honey. And I have a wonderful lawyer I use for estate planning; I can take you to meet her. I know there are a lot of questions you need to be ready to answer before a will can actually be drawn up. Maybe we can have lunch with her and she can review those with you first."

"That would be nice, Mom. Deeks ran through a bunch of them with me already, but that wasn't his specialization, so lunch might be a good idea."

Julia smiled. "Great. What else can I do?"

Kensi considered her mother for a few seconds. Why not accept the support? Certainly there had been no lack of people offering to do whatever they could to help: everyone at work, Roberta and her boyfriend Jim, Kat, Mindy, Mandy, Tiffany, and Tiffani. One of the things her therapist recommended was letting others shoulder some of her burdens. It would do her no good to try to tackle it all herself. She opened the little notebook and started turning the pages, searching for things she still had to do that her mother could handle or at least help with.

"What is all of that?" Julia's eyes were wide.

"Notes from conversation with a lot of people about a lot of things." She randomly flipped to one. "This, for example, is from the afternoon I spent on the phone when I called to change the beneficiary of my life insurance policies to Deeks." Another page. "From the next day when I thought to ask if my death would be considered line of duty or accident, because that affects the amount of the payout." Flip. "The always changing list of medications I'm on." Flip. "Types of foods to avoid." Flip. "What else? There's a whole alphabet soup of acronyms I've been learning more about: FLETC, IVF, BMT, GVHD."

"IVF? You mean in-vitro fertilization?"

Damn. Kensi hadn't necessarily intended to mention that to her mother, at least not at this stage. Oh well, what could it hurt? "Yes. If I need to have a bone marrow transplant, that was the BMT I just mentioned by the way, the chemotherapy I'd need beforehand could leave me infertile. I need to know what the options are so Deeks and I can figure out if it's something we want to pursue."

"Why wouldn't it be? Don't you and Marty want to have children?"

Kensi smiled a little. "That answer seems to change for each of us depending on the day of the week." At her mother's confused look, she explained further, "We've yet to be on the same page at the same time when the topic of children comes up."

Julia put her hand over Kensi's on the table. "I'm sure one day you will be. And I'd hate to think that you'll both decide to have a family only to discover that you can't."

"We can still have a family even if I can't get pregnant, Mom. But I know what you mean. Unfortunately, it's not as easy as just deciding that this is what we want to do."

"Why not?"

"Timing, for one. My health, for another. Then there's the money, of course." Kensi wasn't going to say more, but did so when her mother stared at her expectantly. "In order to preserve my fertility, I would have to have my eggs harvested, fertilized, and the embryos frozen. That whole process can take up to a month, depending on where I am in my menstrual cycle if we decide to do it. If I end up needing a transplant because the current treatment fails, I might not be healthy enough to do it."

"So why don't you just do it now, even if you don't know if you'll need the transplant? Certainly your health is good enough now."

"I can think of eight to twelve thousand reasons why." Kensi could tell her mother was getting excited by the idea of grandbabies, and was beginning to regret saying anything about it.

"That's how much it costs for IVF?"

"No, that's the range for the cost of one round of harvesting eggs and fertilizing them. Freezing and storing any embryos that result is extra, of course. It's a lot of money for something we may never decide to follow through with." Or get the chance to, Kensi thought but didn't say.

Julia looked as though she was about to say something, but Kensi cut her off, "Look Mom, I told you there's a lot of moving parts Deeks and I are trying to manage right now. This IVF thing is just one small piece of the puzzle still, and it's something we're only thinking about. So please don't get all excited, okay?"

"I won't, I promise. Whether you give me grandchildren or not, what's most important is your health." Julia reached over to give her daughter a hug.

"Thanks, Mom."

AN: Hope this wasn't too heavy on the medical-speak, but Kensi, Deeks, and I are becoming quite knowledgeable in a lot of fascinating topics. Most of the medical information I've presented here is accurate, but not all. So if you ever find yourself suffering from aplastic anemia due to being trapped in a downed helicopter, don't use this story for medical advice!