Chapter 7: A/N: Hi again! This is my second to last chapter! One , maybe two more and this story will be finished :/. Thank you so much for all the support! Please, please, PLEASE R&R!


"Sam! Oh my god!" Jules screams from the opera box watching her boyfriend's body jerk from a severe seizure. "Sarge we have to get him out of here! I'm sick of this 'let's wait for Sam', s***. He's having a seizure, he's lost too much blood and he's unconscious for god's sake!"

"Jules please! Settle down! I'm thinking okay!" Greg exclaims. He doesn't know what to do exactly. Advance on the subjects not knowing exactly how many there are and get Sam the hell out of there and to the ER before he flat-lines again or wait for the perps to give up and hope Samtastic can wiggle himself out of this one too.

Looking down at the jerking cop, Micah still sees the uncanny resemblance of his deceased son in Sam's face. His eyes are screaming at him to help his boy but his brain distinguishes the slight difference between the two kids: Jacob was younger.

"Terrance what's wrong with him?" He asks quietly and flatly.

"Kid's having a reaction to the morphine. I don't know if he's allergic but his body sure isn't likin' it. It sounds like he's breathing fine though."

"What happens if he dies?" Micah asks even quieter.

The ex-medic glances up to look into his troubled friend's face. It's very pale and almost completely desensitized to the scene in front of him. His eyes are empty, his voice flat. Nothing holds emotion. Not his posture or stance, not his face or his tone, nothing.

'What's gotten into him?' Terrance thinks.

Micah has been acting rashly ever since they jumped this poor kid and now he decides to be quiet and think about what he's doing?

"If he dies, we all go down for murder." He answers his friend's question softly, his eyes locking with Micah's but they're vacant. "Everyone, Micah. We all go down for the murder of a Strategic Response Unit officer. That's a big deal, buddy. You need to think your next move through very, carefully."

Micah just nods slightly once and turns away from the kid on the floor who's seizure has abruptly stopped. Terrance breathes a sigh of relief before checking for vitals. Pulse: weak, slow, unsteady, but definitely there. Breathing: shallow, laboured, slow.

'Poor kid really just needs a bag of blood.' Terrance thinks.

Sam slowly begins to come around moaning softly as he struggles to open his eyes. As his big, watery, baby blue eyes peel open, they're gently tugged open further by soft hands. Incoherent words filter into calming sentence. Sam feels a hand on his hair, stroking it, telling him that he'll be okay. He figures that of course he'll be fine, he's always fine, right? The only thing he can't figure out is where he is and what just happened.

"Wh-where am I?" he asks groggily.

The hand prying his eyes open wider has moved and is brushing against his cheek.

"You're with us, kiddo. You just had a seizure from the morphine I gave you. Are you allergic to it?" Terrance asks.

"Morphine? Yeah, I'm allergic to one of the ingredients in it." He answers sleepily.

'He's lost too much blood. He won't be able to stay with us much longer.' To Terrance's surprise, Sam hauls himself into a sitting position.

"Easy there, cowboy. Your brain hasn't registered how weak you are just yet."

"I'm fine."

Terrance cracks a half-smile. "Yeah, sure you are. Just keep tellin' yourself and it'll become true right? Wrong. Here, let me help you." He offers his hand to help the young cop stand.

Once on his feet, the ex-medic wraps his left arm around Sam's back keeping the other hand free. Sam blinks rapidly before his knees buckle. Terrance quickly changes the position of his hands to support the younger man. He places the cop's right arm around his own shoulders keeping his left arm underneath Sam's and his right hand around their victim's abdomen. Micah's eyes slowly follow the pair across the warehouse where Terrance is calling to the goons in the opera box to let Team One come down to get their man. Some colourful language is exchanged but it all settles when Micah gives his nod of approval. The Team is taken down and out into the open warehouse where Sam and Terrance are waiting for them. Greg approaches the ex-medic cautiously who is saying his goodbyes to Sam. Never in his whole career has Sergeant Parker seen a hostage and hostage taker bond so well and bid goodbye to one another.

"You'll be okay. You're safe with them, Sam. Take care of yourself, you hear? You're a good kid." Terrance whispers, ruffling his hair.

The SRU officer smiles softly, obviously in pain and says, "Thanks man. You too. God is good,"

"All the time." Terrance answers.

"And all the time,"

"God is good. Thanks Sammy. Now go with your team. I want you to get an MRI and your shin and arm fixed up, you copy?"

"Copy that, sir."

"Good kid. Maybe I'll see ya 'round sometime."

"You will." Sam answers, giving a weak hug to Terrance who returns it, careful not to touch his arm.

"Bye kiddo. Hey, Micah didn't mean anything by this. He's a good guy, he's just hurting. Losing Jacob was real hard on him and he never received the help he should've had."

"I know. If you can sir, please don't let him hurt himself."

"I'll try my best. My name's Terrance."

Sam smiles. "My name's Sam. It's nice to meet to you, Terrance."

"Nice to meet you too Sam."

"Bye." Sam says turning towards his team.

"Yeah, bye." Terrance answers, giving him a French kiss on his right cheek. The ex-medic hands the arm that isn't broken to Greg who then gathers Sam into his arms, in a bear hug, stroking his hair and even beginning to cry a bit.

"Sarge I'm okay. Really, I'm fine." Sam states.

"I almost lost you out there, Sam. Don't you ever, ever, scare me again like that. Do you hear me, boy? Never again."

"Yes sir. My apologies." He answers quietly, immediately switching back into soldier-mode.

"Oh Sam, cut it out. You're not a soldier anymore. I'm not your CO."

"Yes you are, sir."

Greg sighs and opens his mouth but then decides to leave it at that. The rest of the team gathers around Sam, patting his shoulder and exchanging other friendly gestures.

"That was some d*** quick thinking, Sam. If only all that crap was true." Ed states laughing, clapping his shoulder. "I didn't know you could lie so good."

"It wasn't lies, Ed." A new voice says before Sam can speak. Everyone turns around, excluding Sam who already sees who is talking, to see Spike. Sam smiles his signature half-smile to the bomb tech.

"Oh come on Spike, you don't actually believe that crap. Sam just made it all up to get his ass out of there alive." Ed argues but Spike's words leave most of the whole team in disbelief.

"No. I didn't make it up. How could you have possibly thought that I fantasized it? I talk about it all time when we're on shift."

"C'mon, all those weird Christian slams are funny." Ed presses.

"You just don't get it do you? Jules, tell them it's not fake. C'mon you know what I talk about at dinner and at night to you. You know it's not just a bunch of lies." Sam says looking at Jules.

"You were being serious all those times?" she asks. "I always thought you were just mocking the General, just being funny about it."

"The General?! My father, a Christian? No, my father is rich, lying, cheating, greedy, atheist scum-bag. My father is a monster. He doesn't care about anyone, much less his family or the children in the wars that he kills every day. My father is a despicable, grotesque creature of this world and don't you ever compare him to me again." Sam growls, a look of murder growing in his eyes.

"So that's why you left the Army? You're a Christian so you don't like war." Ed concludes.

"No, Ed. I didn't leave JTF2. I was discharged. I killed my best friend. My father tried to kill me. The system discovered the only that way they could protect my life was to remove me. Christians don't hate war. God says many times that there will be wars. Lots of them. I disagree with war when we go into it for the wrong reasons and because the General always goes into them for the wrong reason."

"Sam, can talk to you for a minute?" Jules asks pulling him to the side, out of earshot of the others while they interrogate Spike. "I had no idea that you were being serious this whole time about this God of yours. Why didn't you tell me?"

"Oh so saying, 'Jules I'm being serious,' like I did many times when you started laughing wasn't enough for you?" Sam asks. "You just always blew me off and thought everything I said was a joke? Do you know me, Jules? I don't joke around that often and you can definitely tell when I am doing so. Why did you never take me seriously? We've been talking about it for months!"

"I – I'm sorry. I just didn't think you were being for real. You know, if, if you actually do believe in this, I – I don't think I can stay with you Sam. I can't deal with you believing in something that is completely fictional. You choose, Sam. Tell me that this God thing is all a joke or tell me that you love me and only me. No one and nothing else. Who's it going to be? Me or this God?" Jules presses.

"This is goodbye then, Jules. It was nice meeting you." Sam states with not so much of a hint of regret or doubt in his voice or eyes.

Jules' jaw drops, as does the rest of the team's when they hear Sam's declaration. 'Sam would give anything, his life even, to be with Jules. This God of his must mean an awful lot.' Wordy thinks.

"So that's it? You're breaking up with me?"

"Yes. I am. You asked me to choose between you and God, and God always comes first. No matter what. I thought you of all people would know that, but I guess I was just mocking the General that night." Sam shoots back with a bite of anger and sarcasm in his voice.

"Sam!"

"Jules it's done. It's over. I decided. I'm not changing my answer. I'm not sorry. I had a lot of great times with you and now it's over. You wanted my answer and that's exactly what I gave you."

Spike stands shocked, watching Sam. He knows how much Jules meant to him and now it's all boiled down to this? A sudden voice jerks everyone out of their thoughts. They had been keeping an eye on everyone in the warehouse and now all of the attention is focused not on Sam, but on Micah. The team quickly forms a crescent around the distraught ringleader. Micah holds a pistol in his hands, pointing towards the ground.

"No, Micah no." Sam whispers, knowing exactly what Micah is attempting to pull. "Don't fire. Suicide by cop." He says softly. "He's not going to fire."

On the end of the right hand side of the crescent is where Sam stands. His hands slightly raised in a non-threatening position, barely able to support his own weight. His leg aches like nobody's business and head is killing him, but he is on full alert.

"Sam, your God is real. He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and He is a forgiving God but He could never forgive me for all of the awful things I've done to everyone, including you. I'm sorry." Micah states, tears rolling down his face.

He raises the gun higher and all weapons go up. Ed takes a step forward as he is directly in front of Micah and his gun. The pistol is jerked higher, now even with Ed's head, Micah's finger shaking on the trigger just as Sam is throwing himself through the air yelling, "Micah no!". A finger pulls a trigger and a body collapses to the ground with a sickening thud.

As the smoke from Ed's barrel clears, the team immediately sees something that they will never forget. Micah stands quivering, the pistol in one hand pointing straight to the ground. Sam lay motionless on the shiny, grey cement floor, blood leaking out of a fatal bullet wound to the center of his heart. Micah drops to his knees, sliding the pistol across the floor, sobbing as he sees a much less gory scene of his son's murder. Ed's face is pale as Greg and Wordy rush over to Sam.

"Look what you've done to him!" Micah screams. "Look what you've done!"

Greg kneels on one side of Sam as Wordy is on the other. Their teammate lays still on his back. His face is grey, his lips white, his eyes closed. Wordy tends to his wound that hit him square in his heart while Greg is checking for vitals. Sergeant Parker sits back on his heels and looks at Ed shaking his head.

"Eddie, he's gone. He's gone."

Jules burst out into quiet, choked sobs, turning into Spike for comfort. He wraps his arms around her, still on the phone with EMS. He called had called them immediately once he saw that someone was standing and that someone could not have been Sam.

"Sarge they'll be here," Spike starts but then notices two paramedics rushing into the warehouse. "Now, I guess."

"We were just up the road when we heard the call." One of them states, placing a stethoscope on Sam's chest, avoiding the hole in the middle of his heart. "There's no pulse. Get a field bandage on that wound. We'll get him on the gurney and start CPR." He says to his partner who is already one step ahead of him.

The two medics rush out with Sam, performing CPR the whole time. It has been two minutes since Sam was initially shot. Micah is a crying, screaming mess, even with Terrance trying to calm him down. All of the perps were taken off by the unis but Micah refused to be separated from Terrance. Greg told the ex-medic that he would see what he could do to lessen the charges against him since he really helped in keeping Sam alive and the situation de-escalated.

A minute later, the ambulance pulls into the bay and they quickly unload their passenger, rushing him into the ER. They were unable to revive him but there is still a slim chance that a doctor could with an AED. Dr. Sarev and a nurse immediately begin shocking their patient with the AED as blood is soaking through the bandage.

"Charge to 360!" Dr. Sarev yells for the fifth time after he had been working on Sam for the past five minutes.

"Sir, I think you should stop." The nurse states.

"No! Charge it to 360!" He repeats. The nurse complies. Sam's chest arcs upwards as the blue lightning bolts of electricity race through his body. A technician is firmly holding an oxygen mask over his face. The heart monitor is still flat-lining when the doctor only has one more thing left to do. "God if it is Your will, please let this young man live again." He says. "Charge to 380!"

"Sir?"

"Just do it!"

The AED is charge to 380. Dr. Sarev yells "Clear!" as he pressed the paddles into Sam's chest. His whole body jerks and he gasps for air, his eyes beginning to open. Dr. Sarev sighs and smiles.

"God's not dead." Sam states weakly through his mask.

Dr. Sarev ruffles Sam's hair. "No He isn't." To the nurse he says, "Get this kid down to the OR, now."

Sam smiles at his doctor before losing consciousness while being rushed down the hall to be operated on. Dead for seven minutes. What a story he has to tell.


A/N: Okay! So epilogue after this, the drama isn't quite over yet but you can sort of breathe now. Thanks so much for reading! Please, please, PLEASE REVIEW! Thank you!