A/N: I have to apologize for the huge delay in posting this. I don't even really have an excuse other than life getting crazy and me kind of shuffling this to the back burner. Thank you to JaniceS and Dramamama for proverbially kicking my butt back into gear. After all this time I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint anyone who's still reading. I'll try my darndest not to let as much time go by between the next updates. Thanks, Riptide.
Chapter 10: Known
"Know thy self, know thy enemy." – Sun Tzu, the Art of War.
Deeks drops his head down into his hands, drags his fingers through his hair, wincing at the knots, and huffs out a noisy breath that whistles between his teeth, and then another when the first only makes his head feel like it's going to explode. He feels like he's being torn in two very different directions because Callen's out of control in a breathtaking kind of way and he needs to find a way to get his head screwed on straight again, but there's Kensi's blood still drying under his fingernails and her hand clenched tight around his knee even in unconsciousness.
He's patched up the gunshot wound to her thigh as best as he can, he's got all the first aid training of a lemur though, and beyond the basics of controlling the bleeding he doesn't have a clue. He's tied his belt painfully tight just above the wound, a through and through to the meaty part of his partner's thigh, and she'd had to talk him through stitching the wound with a level of strength that makes him wonder at just who his partner really is. She's strong in a way thathe doesn't know, a fighter to trump anyone, and he feels awe well up in his heart that she'd ever love him the way she does.
She's Kensalina, sunshine and gunpowder, and a strength that he marvels at, and if home is a feeling then she's it in a nutshell, and he doesn't know what he'd do without her. He's come so very, very close to finding out today though, and there's fear tangling icy fingers in his gut, because he never wants to see what the future he's just started to imagine looks like without her in it.
He's gone to terrible lengths before for the people he cares about, shot his father for the same kind of reasons, and he feels an entirely different kind of fear for the things he'd do for Kensi's sake. She's his life and his home, his partner in every sense of the word, and they've had close calls before, but nothing like this.
Deeks curls his fingers around her hand on his knee, worries about the chilliness he feels on her skin and the ashen edge to her pallor, and vows with something bone deep and essential that he'll never let her go. He thinks of the mezzanine outside of Red Fort and how he'd imagined them there on a vacation, maybe even a honeymoon in a future he hadn't realized he wanted, and knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that he'd go to the ends of the earth for this woman.
Deeks leans back, trying to stretch the tension from his shoulders and loosen the ball of worry that's lodged itself in his chest, and then he startles, fingers twitching for his gun because Callen's standing opposite him and there's an edge of something he doesn't care to name in the agent's eyes. Callen raises an eyebrow at him, icily cold and untouchable in a way that makes goosebumps break out across his skin, "Deeks."
Callen's so very out of control, in a way that Deeks doesn't know how to relate with the Callen he's used to, the one who's cold and distant and so very controlled, because he knows that version of their team leader. That Callen's quite possibly the most dangerous man he's ever met, but he protects his team with his life and he's gone to incredible lengths to keep them safe.
This isn't that Callen, though. This is an entirely different monster, literally because Deeks wonders at the humanity of this thing that's clawing its way up from under Callen's control. It's something else, this legend that's something more than just an alias, because it's far closer than Max Gentry, baser and far more primal. Its survival instinct and savagery, and Deeks wonders just what's happened in Callen's life to create this less than human thing inside of him. He knows bits and pieces of Callen's past, knows none of it has been good or particularly easy and thinks that if Max is his way of dealing with his father, than he isn't sure he wants to know what Callen's running from with Yuri.
It's nearly cost him his partner today though, because he knows just how very close they came and feels something like terror drag icy fingers through his chest when he remembers Kensi bleeding in that warehouse. Sunshine and gunpowder, and a smile that feels like home. And remembers the timbre of his own voice, Kensi's down.
He's angry all of a sudden, shaking with a frightening kind of rage that he doesn't know what to do with. He wants to rage and scream and rail against this thing that's Callen's own version of Max, wants to make Yuri feel this same fear he did in that warehouse in the packing district. He feels wild and out of control, like he's about to fly off the handle and maybe he is, but they're half way around the world, hunting for a missing nuke and his partner's nearly died today.
He's on his feet before he realizes it, dislodging Kensi's hand from his knee gently, to stalk across the room after Callen. He's shaking, he realizes distantly fear and rage mixing with exhaustion in his chest. It's a heady mixture, bubbling up and clouding his judgement, Max Gentry slipping the leash, and he thinks for a moment that they both have their demons, but those demons were never meant to meet.
"What the hell?" He snaps then, chasing after Callen because the agent's crossed the warehouse already. He isn't yelling, not yet, but somehow he feels like he should be. "Seriously, what the hell?"
It's Yuri that turns on him then, the features too sharp for Callen and an edge that's just on the wrong side of feral for the lead agent, and Deeks thinks that he should back off, but he's too far gone already and they've come too close today. Callen's been out of control for days now and he's been letting it go for far too long.
He's got one hand fisted in the agent's shirt before he realizes what he's doing, and then he shoves hard, crowding Callen back into the metal walls of the industrial space they've borrowed. He's out of control himself, in a way he hasn't allowed in years, not since before Kensi and NCIS, because he knows just how easily he could become Max, his own version of this monster that's clawing its way out from under Callen's control.
"My partner nearly died today," he snaps, and Callen flinches sharply under the hand he has fisted in the agent's shirt. It's the first sign of the real Callen that Deeks has seen since before India nearly a week ago, but he's too angry to let this go because this has been going on for long enough.
"There are risks to this life, Deeks." Callen snaps, his voice is harsh, edged with Yuri's apathy and a cold kind of detachment that makes Deeks question the humanity of this legend that seems to be so much more. "Nothing's guaranteed for people like us."
Deeks breathes deep, trying to quell the anger rising up in his chest, and releases the grip he has on Callen's shirt to run a hand through his hair in frustration. "We're not like you though, are we G?"
Callen flinches again, a barely there tension that comes and goes in half the space of a heartbeat and Deeks thinks that that's the real issue here, because whatever this is, it's not G either. "I don't know what the hell this is Callen, but it's not you."
"Maybe it's not me Deeks," His voice has gone quiet, something broken open and laid bare in his tone that Deeks doesn't quite know what to do with. "But it's necessary, and right now we need him."
"Yuri?" Deeks asks, because Callen talks about this alias like a separate person and it's starting to freak him out. He knows just what kind of legend G is, he's seen him become anyone, from anywhere at the drop of a hat but this is an entirely different monster and he wishes for the thousandth time that Sam were here. "Or the Ghost?"
Callen reacts like someone's just walked over his grave, a shiver that works its way down his spine like a living thing and a flicker of emotion that breaks through in icy blue eyes the same way Yuri does his control. Deeks flinches in return, fingers twitching for his gun, because he's under no delusions of any kind about just how dangerous Callen is right now.
"Don't," Callen whispers, and it shakes Deeks to hear the edge of desperation in his voice. This isn't right, because Callen doesn't beg for anything but this is the closest Deeks has ever seen him to the edge and it's terrifying in its own way. "Just- don't, Deeks."
"No," Deeks snaps, and for a moment the sharpness of his own voice startles him. He's out of control himself, and some small part of him wonders just what he's hoping to accomplish here. "I can't let this go, not this time. My partner nearly died today, Callen."
His hand snaps out before he can realize just what it is that he's doing, and the next thing Deeks knows is that he's got a hand fisted in Callen's shirt again, thin fabric rough between his fingers, and he's crowding the lead agent backward. Callen doesn't exactly surrender, and Deeks wonders distantly if someone left more than just straightforward out of Callen's super spy dictionary, but he doesn't take a swing at him either and just like that his anger evaporates just as quickly as it had come.
"There's a reason I work alone, Deeks." Callen speaks up when he can't, and his voice is soft, laced through with something that begs Deeks to understand just what it is that he isn't saying.
Marty drags his fingers through his hair and then down his face in frustration, feeling the pull and drag of two day old stubble, and wishes that Sam were here to translate Callen-ese. "Is that why we're here then? Because I thought you ran half way around the world for the people that took a shot at your partner."
"He's dangerous, Deeks." Callen's voice has dropped to a barely there whisper, like he's afraid of being overheard, and Deeks drags his gaze around the empty warehouse to see if they've gained an audience that he hasn't noticed.
He meets Callen's eyes, icy blue with a brittle kind of fragility that he'd never have associated with his team leader, and realizes that however much Yuri frightens him, it pales in comparison to how Callen himself feels about this monster that hides under his skin. "I'm dangerous."
It's a revelation that rocks his world on its ear, and Deeks steps back trying to wrap his head around this new understanding of this man that he's starting to think he can call a friend. Callen's dangerous, he's always known that on some level because the man bleeds a type of hardness that can't be faked, but this is something else, something far more visceral than that unconscious type of knowledge. He's capable of things that turn the detective's stomach, and he remembers the very real fear on Benji's face in the courtyard of Red Square and thinks that this is a side of Callen that he was never meant to see.
"We all have our darkness, G." Deeks says, and wishes that the words didn't sound hollow even as he does. This is something more than darkness and they both know it. "Someone once told me that what counts is how we use that darkness."
Callen barks a laugh, the sound twisted into something ugly and filled with an unspeakable kind of bitterness. It makes Deeks wonder once again just what's happened in Callen's past and what he's running from with Yuri's frigid apathy. He's so very good at being untouchable and Deeks wonders what exactly he thought this was going to accomplish.
"It's funny," he snips in a tone that suggests he finds it anything but. There's an edge of something Deeks doesn't know how to interpret in his eyes, self-loathing and an unfathomable kind of regret. "But I've heard that before, Deeks. The first time I executed a man."
He rounds on him then, bitter and jaded and broken in a way that Deeks doesn't know how to fix. There's something incredibly wrong about this entire thing because Callen's control is as legendary as his undercover skills, and Deeks has never seen him as close to the edge as he is right now. "The CIA didn't teach me to be a boy scout Deeks."
He's starting to see the heart of this though, Deeks thinks, and it's a far darker place than Callen would like. It's the fear in Benji's eyes in the middle of Red Square, and Yuri's ruthlessness. It's Max Gentry on steroids, and a darkness that curls itself around your soul and digs its claws in deep. It's the question of the humanity of this thing that's slipping through Callen's control, and whatever it is that he's hiding from with Yuri's breathtaking kind of apathy.
He drops his voice to a whisper before he realizes he has because on some level anything louder feels disingenuous, and curls a hand around Callen's shoulder, "You're not a monster, Callen."
The agent smiles then and there's no humour in the move, just a terrible kind of loathing and something broken and laid bare in Callen's eyes that steals Deeks' breath away. "That's where you're wrong, Deeks."