Hey everbody! Thanks for the great reviews....made me happy, and therefore, I have posted another chapter!

Hope you enjoy this!

Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS.

Oh...this is revised. I made a little error in the last posting....*blushes*

CHAPTER 9

This chapter and the following are based on the episodes Hiatus I and II

Abog Galib shook Jen's arm, a small smile appearing on his grimy face.

"…Fire a few rounds. Just do not hit me," he claimed his passport from Jen, before walking towards the adjoining room. Jen was about to ring her team to tell them not to shoot him, when he stopped her and motioned her over to join him in the other room. Jen did so, and before she could even open her mouth to question him, she felt an excruciating pain hit her body, saw the red smattering of blood in an explosion, felt the shrapnel bury deep into her flesh, and fell into the white expanse.

Pain, more pain. Jen felt the pain everywhere, felt her skin burn. She blinked once, the world seemed to still be covered in a yellowy-red film. People screamed around her, doctors hurrying to and fro.

"Gunny, Gunny!" the doctor called to her. She wanted to answer back, but she couldn't, her throat was all dry and all she could do was blink. She wanted to scream at him, tell him she was in pain. All she could do was blink.

She felt him pry at her eyes, poking at her. It was unpleasant, the burning sensation intensified every time his hand touched her skin.

"STOP!" she wanted to scream, "DON'T SAVE ME! LET ME GO!"

She had just been in some sort of an explosion, probably in Desert Storm. She felt disoriented. She could remember the huge bang of the mine, her buddies falling over, she could feel her head collide onto the solid dirt, her heavy gear falling around her and the metal clang of her helmet. The relief.

And she could remember Belle telling her the news.

They were dead.

Shane…and Kelly were dead.

She felt the doctor pressing the plastic mask on her face, the burning sensation intensified. She breathed in and out, deep breaths that did not help at all.

The world was pain. Pain, burning pain.

Soon it was too much and she sunk once more into the whiteness.

She saw Shane. The dark mess of stuff on top of his head he called hair was neatly combed in a farewell gesture. He held Jenny in his strong arms, looking at her so lovingly, the same look he had every time she left for service. She felt so safe in those arms, looking into the blue gaze of his.

"You don't have to do this you know," Shane whispered the same words he always used, "You don't have to go. Get an honourable discharge. I don't know if I can let you walk away today, Jenny-bear." He always made it hard, but Jen had always left, because her country needed her.

"I know Shaney," she stroked his cheek, "But I have to go." She reached up and mussed his hair, making it all crazy again. She loved it that way. He smiled, before his face turned solemn once more.

"Say it all again. Promise me," he held her tighter, he held his wife tighter.

"I will come home. Safe and whole," Jen repeated the familiar words. Shane swatted her face playfully.

"Not those, honey."

"I love you Shane. And I won't run off with some hot military guy," she replied back jokingly, before he leaned in for a kiss. She readily returned it, savouring his touch, the last one for a while.

"MUMMY!!!!!!" Little Kelly ran out from the house, finally able to retrieve the object she had been looking for.

"EEEWWW!" She turned away at the sight of her Mummy and Daddy kissing. Shane chuckled, as Jen ran forward and swung Kelly into her outstretched arms, pecking her forehead. She immediately regretted the action of picking Kelly up, she had forgotten momentarily how heavy her baby was. She put Kelly down again, causing the little redhead to pout most unceremoniously.

"I love you, Kel," Jenny knelt to her daughter's height level, hands tight on her Kelly's shoulders. Kelly smiled once more, before bringing out the picture she had prepared for her Mummy.

"See, Mummy, you can always see Daddy and me now, when you are off fighting off baddies," she showed her drawing of a stick-figure Jenny with red scribbles around her head, with the stick-figures of Shane (with even messier scribbles of dark brown) and Kelly (who was wearing a triangle dress with flower scribbles). Jen couldn't help the little tears that appeared in her eyes after she inspected the drawing.

"I'll miss you Mummy," Kelly whispered as Jenny pulled her daughter into a big bear hug. Shane joined in, rubbing Jenny's back comfortingly.

"I'll miss y'all," she pulled back at last, before kissing Kelly one last time, and then Shane. She walked towards the car, turned back and waved.

"Never easy to leave your folks Gunny," the man in the car stated conversationally, "Especially the kids."

"Ya think, Belle?" Jen rested her head onto the head-rest, closing her eyes.

The never-stopping explosions. Desert Storm. The days of shooting in between the rocks, being teased mercilessly by the chauvinistic pigs of men, laughing whenever possible with Belle and Hayley. Reading the Bible as if to remove the sin of mass-murder from their souls. They couldn't help it. It was necessary.

And then the announcement. Belle, her wrinkled face unsmiling. Hayley flanking her, looking concerned, Joel and Brandon nearby. Solemn.

"They're both dead. Shane and Kelly. I'm so sorry, Jennifer," Belle broke it to her in the best way she could. Jenny felt herself break with anguish. Shane and Kelly were all she had. Other than that dratted father back in Stillwater, who had managed to hook up with a woman a few days after her mother died. She was a mother, she was a wife. Now, she was nothing.

She couldn't contain her grief. She wanted to die, die with them. She couldn't live any longer.

The next time they went out, she ran head first into the explosions, her gun aimed, ready. The bloodlust was in her eyes, and soon, she tumbled onto the ground. Hoping that she was dead. Knowing she wasn't.

When she was discharged from service, she hobbled to their graves. They were in a nice parkland area, Kelly would have loved the green grass, the peacefulness interrupted only by the calls of birds. Maybe not the fact that it was a cemetery.

It was so real. Seeing their graves etched with their names. "Shane Berkeley". "Kelly Berkeley". She should have been with them. Her name and grave alongside them.

"Jennifer Berkeley"

And she found herself sitting next to the small patch of flowers near their graves, gun pointed at her head.

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