Operation: Unfamiliar Feelings
Chapter 10
Consciousness comes slowly to Callen. The first thing he notices is the smell of something antiseptic. Then, he hears beeps.
Hospital.
The word floats around in his brain. He's in a hospital. Why is he in a hospital?
Memory comes flooding back and Callen nearly bolts upright, restrained only by a pair of very strong hands pushing him down.
"Easy there, partner."
Callen blinks several times to clear his vision and his eyes focus on Sam. Sam's there and he's wearing what appears to be scrubs.
"I take it visiting hours are over?" Callen croaks out, eyes taking in everything he can see from his position. The lights are off and the window is dark. It must be late.
"It's 3am. Only you would wake up in the dead of night, G."
Callen flails again, nearly ripping the IV out of his hand as he tries to sit up even a little bit. "Ow. Where's Nell?"
"Take it easy," Sam hisses.
Sam is staring at him intently and when Callen acquiesces, Sam stands up and gestures to the other occupant of the room. Nell is in the adjacent bed.
"Asleep or unconscious?"
"Asleep and sedated. She has a mild concussion and a fractured left arm, cuts and bruises, too. But she was working herself into a frenzy when you wouldn't wake up," Sam explains.
Callen takes several deep breaths, calming himself down now that he can see Nell. That's when he notices he's sore all over.
"I feel like I got hit by a door," he winces, rolling his right shoulder.
"That's because you did get hit by a door," Sam replies, taking a seat beside Callen's bed. "Several. The doors on the cabinets closest to you blew off when the second explosion hit—you took the brunt of it. They may have saved your life, actually, although you do also have some bruised ribs. I'm surprised you didn't break anything."
Callen grimaces. "Second explosion. Someone wanted to make sure the servers were destroyed."
Sam nods. Both of them turn to look at Nell.
"If I hadn't gone back…"
"G."
"She shouldn't be on this case, Sam."
Sam levels him with a look. "And you were going to stop her how?"
Callen rolls his eyes. "She should be taken off the case. It's too dangerous."
"Right, I want to be there when you tell her that."
Seconds tick by with only the sound of the machinery.
"Damn it."
"At least you know you're on to something?"
"If that's supposed to make me feel better, it's not working."
Sam just shakes his head, then looks between Callen and Nell.
Callen narrows his eyes. "What?"
"She was pretty concerned about you."
"And?"
Sam just stares.
"What?"
"What's going on with you two, G?"
"Nothing, Sam."
Sam shakes his head again. "Yeah, not buying it."
Callen tries to shrug, but ends up wincing in pain instead. "We're just friends. That's it."
"And you?"
"And me, what?"
"Stop playing dumb, you know what I'm talking about."
Callen and Sam enter into some sort of staring contest for a long moment. Callen's the first to look away, his eyes landing on Nell's sleeping form.
"I don't know."
"Well, that's a start."
Callen raises an eyebrow at his partner.
"This could be good for you, G. You always did say you attracted the intellectual type."
Callen scoffs. "This is so not the time to be pursuing a relationship of any sort."
"Maybe not," Sam shrugs. "But maybe it's a good time to think about whether or not she might be the one for you."
"What's gotten into you, Sam?"
"Let's just say getting blown up will give you guys some perspective. Don't wait."
They're released from the hospital after two days, but ordered to stay home the rest of the week. Callen has done the recovery thing more times than he'd like to admit, so he expects the soreness and inability to do everything he used to do. Nell is not and it worries him.
Terri picks them up from the hospital and drives them home. When they get there, Callen's already bracing himself against the seat and door to lever himself out of the vehicle without using back muscles he knows he's not ready to use. As he hobbles to the other side of the car, Nell is still struggling with figuring out how to exit the car.
"Do you guys need any help?" Terri asks, concern in her eyes.
"I'm good." Nell's response is immediate, but judging from the grimace on her lips, Callen knows better.
"Thanks, Terri. I think we can manage."
Terri shifts from foot to foot. "George, Norah—I just want you to know that we will do everything we can to figure out who did this."
Callen nods. "I know you will."
"No, I mean it." There's an uncharacteristic waver in her voice. "This—I know we've had a couple odd incidents but this? No, there's something else going on."
Callen nods again and he'd discuss the point more with Terri but he's more concerned about Nell and her futile movements.
"Take my hand," he murmurs.
"No, I can—"
"Norah."
Callen's tone is gentle and when she looks up at him, he pleads silently with her. A beat passes and Nell takes his proffered hand. Carefully, he helps her out of the car and tucks her by his side.
"At least let me help you to the door…"
"Thanks for the offer, but I think we need to do this ourselves," Callen says. "Don't worry, we'll find our way inside, probably take some painkillers, and pass out."
"Okay. Well, call me if you need anything. And I mean anything, George. And you, Norah," Terri instructs. "And you are not to come back to work—or even check work e-mail or phone calls—until at least next Monday. And only if you're sure you're feeling better."
"Yes, mom," Callen and Nell say in unison.
Terri smiles, genuinely, and runs a hand through her hair. "You kids get some rest."
They wait for Terri to drive off before turning to the long sidewalk to the house.
"Why does this walkway look about a mile long?" Nell asks with a sigh.
"Because it'll feel like we tried to sprint it by the time we get to the house," he answers. "Part of the reason I wanted you to hold onto me is because we'll need to help each other get to the house. My leg started cramping up in the car, so this is going to be interesting."
"Oh. Well. That makes me feel better."
He looks down at her quizzically.
"I thought I was the only one who felt like they were going to fall right over after standing up."
Callen chuckles. "Welcome to recovery. Ready?"
Nell nods and, together, they slowly make their way to the house.
Even though he expects it, by the time they make it to the porch they're moving at hardly more than a snail's pace and limping considerably.
"Can we take a break?" Nell asks.
"Inside. Let's make it inside and we can collapse."
"Deal."
The porch steps are the first major obstacle and they manage to push and pull each other up them. Callen's careful not to jostle Nell's bad arm and he can tell she's trying not to press too much on his bruised ribs. Callen leans most of his weight on the front door as he fishes the keys out of his pocket, shifting to the door frame when he opens it.
At this point, they're both more than willing to sit down. Except, of course, that it's difficult to do that without falling down and that isn't an option because it would hurt too much.
Callen and Nell's eyes meet. "Stairs."
A dozen more awkwardly shuffling movements and they gingerly lower themselves onto the carpeted steps.
"Why does this hurt so much?" Nell gasps.
"We got blown up."
Nell pauses. "Never doing that again."
Callen's lips quirk. "We can only hope."
Nell sighs loudly. "I think your idea of painkillers and sleep sounds really good about now."
"Yeah."
Silence falls between them and neither of them move.
"We're just going to lie here for a while, aren't we?"
"Yep."
"I think I'm okay with that."
An hour later, they've managed to take their painkillers and get upstairs. Neither of them cares enough about appearances to do anything other than crawl up the stairs which, oddly enough, seems to work better than being fully upright.
In a burst of energy, Nell makes it all the way to the master bedroom and Callen can hear her contented sigh when she lies down on the blissfully soft mattress. Callen, meanwhile, is still at the upper landing and he's not very inclined to move for a while. If ever.
"You still alive out there?" she calls.
"Unfortunately."
He hears her giggle and he smiles at the sound. The past few days have been hard on them both, but he's particularly worried about her. He wasn't lying to Sam when he said she shouldn't be on this case. The fact that someone would go through the trouble of blowing up an entire data center speaks volumes to how serious they are. He's still mad at himself for letting her go in by herself. If he hadn't gone back, if he'd lost her—
Callen shakes his head, unwilling to think of the "what if-"s, much less the other implications of what happened. Slowly, he army crawls his way to the master bedroom and parks himself just outside the door. He listens for a moment, satisfied when he hears Nell's even breathing, and allows himself to relax.
He's startled awake by an unknown sound and Callen is surprised to see the windows are darker. He must have fallen asleep, which isn't too surprising. He tries to figure out what woke him when the noise happens again. It sounds like a whimper.
Carefully, he sits up. His muscles are even stiffer from lying on the floor, but he doesn't care. Using the door frame as a support, Callen hauls himself upright and gets to Nell's bed side, ignoring his protesting muscles and ribs.
He waits. Nothing happens. But just as he's about to turn away, she cries out in her sleep and it's such an anguished, pained sound, Callen can't help but reach out to comfort her.
"Wha—Ow." Nell jerks awake at his touch.
"You were having a dream," he whispers, cupping her cheek, his thumb stroking her soft skin. "I'm here."
She grabs his hand and holds it to her. In the dim light, he can barely make out her eyes but he can tell they're wide with fear, the lingering tendrils of whatever nightmare she was having still clutching at her.
"Stay."
Callen goes utterly still, unsure if he really heard what she said. Her grip tightens and he's almost convinced.
"Please stay with me."
Without a second thought, Callen climbs over Nell and lies down on the other side of the bed. She curls into him, her nose pressed to his neck. It's a movement of pure comfort and he's surprised just how much more at ease he is as well. Within moments, her breathing evens out. Callen drops off to sleep not long after.
Nell Jones can't move and she's not really all that upset about it.
When she woke, she was a little alarmed because there seemed to be a heavy weight on her, pinning her down. And then she realized that weight was breathing and she remembered.
She'd had a nightmare and Callen had woken her. She'd asked him to stay and he climbed into bed with her.
If circumstances were different, she'd have been deeply embarrassed by her behavior. She's stronger than this. But this isn't about strength or pride or anything else. It's about pure human comfort. Judging by just how soundly Callen is sleeping, Nell guesses he needed it just as much as she did, still does.
So, she doesn't really mind that he's now sleeping on top of her. Oddly, it makes her feel a little more secure rather than confined. Except for the teeny tiny fact that she really has to use the bathroom.
Moving slowly, partly because she doesn't want to wake him and partly because moving any faster hurts too much, Nell manages to extricate herself from the bed and hobbles to the bathroom.
By the time she gets back, Callen has flipped over onto his back and is staring at the ceiling.
"You're awake." Her voice is raspy.
He looks at her and she can't help but realize she likes the image of him in her bed. She pushes the thought away immediately, unwilling to think of the implications just yet.
"Do you want me to leave?"
Nell shakes her head. "No. Stay."
Callen pats the bedside and Nell climbs back in. They meet halfway, curling into each other again, and stay that way for the rest of the night.
End Part