Thursday – 0030 hours – NCIS Headquarters

Kate had been filling out reports all day, and long past when Tony and McGee had gone home. For that matter, everyone except her and Gibbs had gone home. As usual. On top of completing normal reports, the team had found out in the middle of the day that one of the interns had accidently knocked over a couple of boxes of paperwork in the evidence locker, and it turned into their jobs to sort through and figure out what belonged where. At this point, Kate's sight was blurry, her fingers were covered in paper cuts, the bruises on her abdomen ached and the pain in her leg began to throb. She simply wanted to go home and jump into her nice, comfy bed. Tomorrow, she would ask Mike if he would join her at the Gala, and she was super excited for that. But right now she was sitting at her desk, and she was almost done. She just needed another 30 minutes and she could leave.

Right now, Kate was by herself. Gibbs had gone to take the last of the reorganized boxes down to the evidence locker. It was so nice to be alone, in peace. Gibbs had been grouchy and mean all day, which made Tony whine, and annoyed the hell out of McGee and Kate. Kate was pretty sure that the day couldn't really get any worse.

But then it did.

Kate's phone rang and startled her. It was Mike.

"Hello?"

"Hi Kate, it's Mike"

"Hey Mike, what are you still doing up?" she joked with him.

"I need to talk to you Kate, are you busy?"

"No, why? What's up?" Kate was so confused, and nervous. She thought everything was going well with them and she thought she had a chance at being with someone who could accept her for her. But she knew from the tone of his voice that what he had to say wouldn't be good.

"Listen, I love everything we have right now. I love spending time with you, and I love having fun with you. You are the first person who understands my situation with work and how important my job is to me. It's great…"

"But?"

"But, seeing you in the hospital yesterday…. Well, it scared the crap out of me. I started falling for you, and I just don't think I could see you get hurt all the time, and I know that's part of the job that you love so dearly. I don't want you to think I don't want this to work, but I couldn't take worrying about you all the time. I'm sorry Kate…"

"Yeah," Kate responded quietly, "I understand."

"I still think we should stay friends, if that's ok with you"

"Sure, Mike," she said slowly, "Listen I have to get going, gotta finish this thing…"

"Uh, oh, ok," he said, "Again, I'm really sorry Kate,"

"It's fine, Mike. I'll talk to you soon," she said, and with that she hung up.

Gibbs walked back into the bullpen, and immediately noticed Kate. She looked like someone had just punched her in the gut, and her eyes were lost in her thoughts.

"You ok?" he asked as he moved towards his desk.

"Huh? Uh yeah, I'm fine," she lied.

Kate couldn't breathe suddenly. She wanted to grab her coat and run out into the cold December D.C. air without any direction. She wanted to scream out and yell at the top of her lungs. But instead, she sat back in her chair, and held back a single tear that was threatening to fall down her face. She stared straight at the computer screen and went back to finishing her report as quickly as she could.

As soon as she finished up the last word, Kate hit print and grabbed her coat and purse.

"The report's in the printer, Gibbs," she stated in a low tone and headed towards the elevator, without even saying goodnight.

Gibbs sat there, next to the dim light beaming out from his desk lamp, and watched as she made her way out of the bullpen. Today, she had seemed fine to him, even considering the fact that he was unnecessarily harsh on all of them. But just now something had changed. She looked lost, gone, defeated. He hated to see her like this, especially since he had such a hard time keeping his eyes off of her.

He was so angry at her the other night, for putting herself in danger when she saved the family. He couldn't bear to see her hurt or in pain, and he hated how good she was sometimes. Things only got worse for him when Mike came to visit her.

"What an Idiot…" Gibbs whispered quietly to himself.

Gibbs knew she deserved someone better. He wanted to be the one that made her that happy. But he made sure to remind himself of the consequences of any outside relationship with Kate every single day. For one, their jobs interfered. Not to mention that Kate was quite a bit younger than him. It just killed him, a decorated marine officer and a tough one at that, it broke him down when he couldn't see her happy. He wanted to talk to her, make her feel better, but he also knew that she needed some space before she would talk about anything.

For now, he just needed to follow in her footsteps and head home. He grabbed his things, and shut off his desk lamp before walking out.