Hannibal had been half asleep when he heard the front door downstairs open and slam shut, followed by voices, and he had to strain himself to listen to them at first, one he was able to recognize as Face, and the other voice was a woman's, not Jean's though. No, she was still in bed hopped up on morphine, the voice grew louder and he nodded in confirmation, Amy Allen was back in town.

Two sets of footsteps came pounding up the stairs and Hannibal waited for the door to get thrown open, which it promptly was, and in rushed Amy, changed very much from the last time Hannibal saw her: her hair had grown longer, her skin was tanned heavily, gone were her more professional looking clothes and instead she looked like a tourist just back from a road trip. All of this however quickly went on the back burner as Hannibal noticed the panicked look on her face when she saw him.

"My God, Hannibal, are you alright?" she asked.

"Of course I'm alright, I told you I was fine," Hannibal answered, "Welcome back by the way."

She ignored his last statement and replied only, "You didn't tell me you'd been shot!"

"Of course not," Hannibal said as Amy came over to his bed and threw her arms around him, being careful not to bump his bad arm, "Where would the fun have been in that?"

"Face picked me up and told me what had happened," Amy told him.

"Oh he did, did he?" Hannibal looked past her and over to the lieutenant standing in the doorway with his arms folded and one foot crossed over the other.

Face stood there with a coy look on his face and he shrugged innocently and remarked, "What can I say? I thought she knew."

"A likely story," Hannibal said, then returning his attention to Amy he asked, "So how'd Jakarta treat you, kid?"

"Hannibal," Amy groaned as she stood back up.

"What?" he asked playfully.

"Hannibal!" Amy said as she absentmindedly ran a hand through her hair, "You are going to make me turn gray and wrinkled overnight, my first day back in town and I find out you got used for some nut's target practice."

"Speaking of nuts," Face said, "Where's Murdock?"

"Hmmm, he should've heard you guys coming up," Hannibal noticed, "Maybe he's knocked out too."

Amy looked back at him and asked, "What do you mean knocked out?"

"Well…" Hannibal sat up and started to explain, but he was cut off by a sudden ruckus coming down the hallway and he told Amy, "I think you're about to find out. Amy, we've got a friend I'd like you to meet."

The door swung open again and Jean walked in with Murdock right behind her. It was obvious from the look on Jean's face that she was higher than a kite on painkillers again, though she seemed strangely coherent as she said, "Hannibal, what's going on in here, what's that noise?" then she turned and noticed Amy for the first time and asked, "Who is this?"

Amy shrank back towards the wall when Jean leaned forward and practically lunged at her to get a look at her. Hannibal chuckled and said, "Jean, this is Amy Allen…Amy, there's really no easy way to explain this one, but…say hello to the ex-Mrs. H.M. Murdock."

"The what?" Amy turned back towards him.

"Amy, believe me, it's a long story," Face said, "In short, this is the woman who owns this house."

"Oh, you mean you're not scamming it for the week like every other place you hole up at?" Amy asked.

"So you're Amy Allen," Jean said as she went over to the other woman and added, "The only woman in the whole world, with the present exception of myself, who can cool Face's lava like a bucket of ice water."

"What?" Amy asked, very much confused by this sudden incident.

Jean looked Amy up and down and commented as she felt her hand up and down the clothes she was wearing, "Boy you're a skinny one, what's the matter? Didn't the Jakartians feed you while you was over there?" Her hand found its way to the back of Amy's shirt and seemed to be testing the fabric, as if to see how easy it would be to rip it off, all the while Amy stood there as rigid as a petrified tree, waiting to see what was going to happen. Jean pulled her hand back around and stood straight as she looked Amy over again and she couldn't help commenting, "God, you're cute," she turned to Murdock and said, "You know Murdock, I'll bet if we put her in your clothes she'd look just like you."

Hannibal sat back in bed watching all of this in semi-amusement, he couldn't help feeling sorry for Amy, who didn't have a clue what was going on and seemed mortified by this whole thing, but he couldn't overlook the obvious humor in the situation either.

"Well this has all been good and fun," Jean said, then she turned to Face, poked him and asked, in what she must've thought was a whisper but people in Cleveland would've heard her, "What time is That Girl going home? I don't like strange people in my home and she strikes me as being stranger than most."

"Amy," Hannibal scratched one eyebrow with his index fingernail as he tried to explain, "Try not to take it personally, she's been heavily medicated due to a serious injury and the pills make her, how shall I put this delicately…a raving lunatic."

Amy laughed dryly and replied, "Well no offense, Hannibal, but I don't think I want to stick around and see what she's like when she's normal."

"Well you're in luck," Face said and shook his head as he explained, "Because she's never been normal."

Amy leaned over towards him and squeezed his hand in a death grip and said under her breath, "Face, don't leave me alone with these people."

"Oh really now, Amy," Face said in mock resentment, "You're not being fair, if the four of us can take three months of her poking and prodding us while you've been off chasing foreign politicians for a big scoop, I think you can be a fair sport and indulge them. If nothing else you ought to feel sorry for Murdock, after all he was married to her for a time."

"That's right," Jean's words were starting to slur like she was drunk as she went over to Amy and grabbed both of her hands and said, "We were married and then he got smart and we're not together anymore, so now he's gotta get somebody new for him and I want that to be you, I think you'd be perfect for him, he knows you and you are just his type: normal. He deserves somebody nice like you that he'd have a good future with."

Jean squeezed Amy's hand and brought it up to nuzzle her cheek against as she added, "The way he talked about you and on and on and on at the V.A. when I went to see him, I knew that you were the right one for him, I've always said that you were. All I ever was was an ample opportunity at the right time, and I knew it. You're a very lucky woman, Miss Allen, I hope you realize that…Murdock's out for good this time, so you have my blessing to take him, I hope you two are happy and perfectly hideous children together." The last word was halfway out of her mouth when her head dropped and her whole body slumped back and fell. Murdock caught her just before she cracked her head on the trunk by the bed.

"Come on, Jean," he said as he adjusted his hold on her and lifted her up, "Time to get you back in bed before you totally conk out."

Jean's eyes were closed but she tilted her head back and said groggily, "Murdock, tell Billy to get off the bed, I told you he's not allowed up here."

"I know," Murdock replied, humoring her as he carried her out of Hannibal's room and down the hall.

"That was awkward," Amy said after a brief silence among the remaining people in the room.

"Like I said," Hannibal said, "She's heavily medicated, she's been spouting gibberish for a couple of days now, usually it's not as coherent as that."

"What happened to her, Hannibal?" Amy asked.

"During a fight some wise guy decided to play baseball with his rifle and her ribs," Hannibal answered, "She's been on Hydromorphone ever since."

The expression on Amy's face said how much sympathy she felt for Jean and she asked, "How bad is it?"

"Nothing broken, but that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt," Hannibal answered, "And those pills either make her goofy or put her to sleep, this is her during her active cycle."

"Man," Amy hissed, "Was that when you got shot too?"

"Yeah," Hannibal glanced at his shoulder, "I guess you could say we were a couple of bookends that day, the only injured parties during the fight, on this side anyway."

Amy rolled her eyes and shook her head, "I miss all the fun."

"Well you didn't miss much," Hannibal told her, "It was no place for women."

Amy pointed towards the door, "What about her?"

"Like he said," Face repeated, "No place for women."

Amy turned towards Face and asked, "Exactly how did you meet her?"

"Her parents hired us to find her a year back," Face said, "There's more to the story but to hear the full version you'd have to clear a week."

"No thanks," Amy replied, "I'm not that interested."

"Well, kid," Hannibal said, "It's nice seeing you got back in the country alright, but I'm sure you have better places to be than here with us."

"You've got that right," she said with a knowing smile, "I'll see you guys around, Face, will you show me out?"

"Sure," Face led her out of Hannibal's room, but as they left, Amy asked him where Jean's room was and he pointed down the hall and said, "Follow me."

She did, and they came to the door and went inside and saw Murdock had Jean back in bed and he was seated in a chair by the bed reading to her from one of her Wizard of Oz books.

"How is she?" Amy asked.

Murdock looked up from the book and answered, "Asleep right now."

"Is she in much pain?" Amy inquired.

"When she's not on her pills she is," Murdock answered, "But I've been doing well to make sure that doesn't happen too often."

Amy went over to the bed and looked at the woman asleep in it. She looked back to Murdock and asked, "Were you really married to her?"

Murdock nodded with a look of fond remembrance in his eyes, "Yes, three glorious months."

"Don't feel too bad about missing the reception," Face told her, "None of us were invited."

Amy turned to him and asked, "Face, would you mind leaving us alone for a minute?"

"Won't the neighbors talk?" Face asked teasingly, then, catching the death stare from Amy, he put his hands up in surrender and backed out of the room and closed the door behind him.

"Is what she said true?" Amy asked Murdock.

"Oh she doesn't think you're strange, she just has trouble meeting new people," Murdock said.

Amy shook her head, "No, I don't mean that."

"Well you are looking a little on the thin side," Murdock replied as he pointed to her waist, which needed a belt to keep her jean shorts tightly in place.

"No, Murdock," Amy laughed, "She said that you went on and on about me when she visited you at the V.A."

"Well sure I did," Murdock said, "She'd heard about you briefly so I thought I'd tell her all about you."

Amy wasn't sure what to make of that, so she let it go and instead decided to approach another subject, "So you actually got married?"

"Uh…yeah," Murdock answered as if it had been a trick question, he tried to laugh and told Amy, "Jean thinks I married her just on a whim, and I suppose that's true in part, it was originally just a cover for when the MPs came nosing around. You know, if I'm married then they can't really ask why I was discharged from the V.A."

"So why aren't you still married?" Amy asked.

"Well, it's hard to explain," Murdock said, "Hannibal says it's because we were both too young and inexperienced, neither of us having been married before."

Amy got a humorous look on her face as she asked Murdock, "How did Hannibal take the news when you told him?"

"Well…I think he was as surprised initially as Face and the Big Guy were…but he seemed to come around to it pretty quickly. Only makes sense I guess, I mean we were already married, what could he do about it? Other than accept it and try to make the best of it that is." He laughed and added, "We had to take him to the hospital a while back, and when they put him under he told everybody that she was pregnant, hoo boy was she mad at him."

"Is she?" Amy asked over a laugh, expecting it to be a joke.

"Naw," Murdock shook his head, "No, I regret to say there won't anytime soon be an army of little Murdocks running around."

"Oh well, better luck next time," Amy replied, then her demeanor changed and she said to him, "Murdock…about what Jean said earlier…about you and me?"

Murdock nodded as if he'd been anticipating the question, and he explained, "That was not all just the morphine talking…she's been talking like that since before we got married. For some reason she thinks you and I would be very good together."

Amy laughed nervously, that was certainly not anything she'd expected to hear, let alone on her first day back in town.

"Anyway, she thinks I could do better than her," Murdock said as he sat at the foot of the bed and crossed one leg over the other.

Amy considered it and said as she sat down in the chair by the bed, "I think she's right."

"I think so too," Murdock replied, surprising her, but he quickly made a point of adding, "But I wouldn't want to, I like her."

"Why?" Amy asked over another laugh.

"Well…it's hard to explain," Murdock conceded, and he looked towards Jean as he told Amy, "Her manners certainly leave much to be desired, and Lord knows she's not the nicest person who ever lived, she kind of prides herself on being a rotten human being, likes putting herself up there with Decker."

"She knows Decker?" Amy asked.

"That is the understatement of the year," Murdock told her, "But anyway…"

"But you love her, Murdock?"

He nodded, "Very much, though she certainly doesn't make it easy, that much is for sure."

Amy didn't get it, "Then why did you marry her? Why do you put up with her?"

"That's something else that's hard to explain," Murdock answered, "It's very funny, when we got hired to return her to her parents, we became her protectors, but the whole way she's taken it upon herself to protect me instead, and you know something else, Amy? She can see Billy. You know how B.A.'s always going on about there's no dog there, well Jean can see him too, but the stubborn mudsucker still refuses to admit the obvious truth that Billy is as real as you or I, even though he couldn't answer if my dog is just a figment of my imagination, then why can she see him too?"

"It's a good question," Amy agreed.

Murdock nodded and looked up at Jean and said, "She's a nice girl, she just doesn't like admitting it, but you can tell. She's put her neck on the chopping block a lot for us."

"Sounds like you really do love her," Amy noted.

Murdock eased himself back onto the mattress so he lay half on the edge of it and half off, and lay alongside Jean, who was still oblivious to the people in the room with her, and the conversation that was occurring. Amy noticed the look in the pilot's eyes as he looked over at the unconscious woman and he replied, "Yeah, I guess I do…it's kind of funny, I never even told her until the day after we'd gotten married, but I think she knew."

Amy smiled and said, "I'm sure she did. It all sounds very interesting, Murdock, you'll have to tell me more about it sometime."

Murdock looked back at her with a smile and said, "You got it, chica."

Amy stood up and said, "I hope she feels better soon."

"She will, this isn't the worst thing that's happened to her," Murdock told her, his hand absentmindedly finding its way over her heart and gently rising and falling as she breathed.

"I'll show myself out," Amy said, "And I'm sure Face will show me the rest of the way to the door, see you later, Murdock."

"Bye," Murdock waved her off as she opened the door and left the room. Then when he heard her and Face's muffled voices through the wall, he turned his attention back to Jean and he leaned over and kissed her on the cheek and said as he smoothed back some of her hair, "You hear that, Saint? I think Amy likes you."

Jean woke up later in the afternoon, and despite obvious signs that the pills had stopped working and she refused to take any more, she got out of bed and started walking around the top floor of the house talking about things that had to be done, that she had to get taken care of, all the while Murdock chased after her insisting he would take care of everything himself.

"Murdock, I appreciate your concern but I'm no cripple," Jean said as she pushed open the door to the storage room, "I can still do some things for myself around here."

"I know that you can," Murdock told her as he kept alongside her, "But I'm going to help you, and I refuse to take no for an answer."

Jean looked at him and tried to be cross but all she did was break out in a laugh and she said, "Alright, if you insist," and she went over to the window and opened it up.

Down below near the driveway they heard two people talking and looking out the window they saw it was Face and B.A. Jean called down to them, "Hey, what're you two monkeys doing down there?"

Both men stopped jabbering with each other and looked up to see who was yelling at them and both called up in response that they were just discussing something in the closest thing to privacy as there was to be found in her house. Immediately after that, Face felt something light hit him on the head and he turned to B.A. and asked him, "What was that?"

"What was what?" B.A. asked.

"Alright, Murdock," Jean told him, "If you want to help me then there is something around here that you can do."

"What's that?" Murdock asked, then felt something hit him in the head too and he brought his hand up to cover the injured section.

Down below something hit the driveway and B.A. bent over and saw that it was half of a pecan with the shell still intact and he looked up to the tree nearest them and they saw a squirrel that had picked off another nut and was chewing the middle out of it. B.A. pointed up at Murdock who was still rubbing the side of his head and laughed, until one fell down and hit him as well, then he looked back up the tree and growled at the squirrel.

"When I got this place," Jean explained to Murdock, "The realtor forgot to tell me it came complete with a neighbor who occupies that nut tree. That's all he's done the last three weeks is climb up there, take the nuts out, eat halfway through them, then toss the other halves down on the sidewalk so I smash them when I walk out in the morning. I've tried throwing the nuts back at him but he just jumps to another branch and resumes business as usual and does it all day, so if you could find some way to get that bushy rat out of the tree and this yard entirely, I would appreciate it very much."

Murdock saluted and replied, "You got it, Saint," and then without warning he lunged off of the stairway and managed to land in the middle of the tree.

"That fool just gets crazier every day," B.A. told Face.

"Well let's see if he has any luck with it," Face said, "At any rate it's got to be more entertaining than whatever's on the TV right now."

Jean watched from the window for a few minutes and saw Murdock shimmy up the tree and try calling out the squirrel in its native tongue. They all looked on in amusement as Murdock clucked and squawked and chattered like the squirrel and likewise started picking the pecans off and biting them through the shells, but he quickly decided he didn't like the taste of them, and instead of tossing them down to the ground he started tossing them at the squirrel to drive it out of the tree. Jean stayed and watched the spectacle for a couple of minutes, and then decided since the three of them were outside, this was an ample opportunity for what she had to do. So she stepped back into the room, closed the window and went down the hall to Hannibal's room and went in.

"Hannibal," she said as she went over to the bed, "I need to talk to you, I've got a problem."

"You are just as bad as the nurses in the hospital," Hannibal told her, "You want me to sleep and take it easy, so I do, and as soon as I'm asleep, you come barging in wanting me to wake up. What is it?"

Jean shifted her gaze to the floor for a minute as she explained, "Well it's like I said, I've got a problem."

"Then you should've stayed married to Murdock," Hannibal told her teasingly, "You have that baby now and that kid's going to grow up without any last name and he won't be able to get any mail."

Jean groaned and covered her hand over her eyes and Hannibal couldn't tell if she was laughing or crying, either way she seemed near hysterics. She pulled her hand down and looked at the colonel and said, "You have no idea, Hannibal."

He looked at her and commented, "Well you're surprisingly coherent now so I'm going to guess the pills have worn off, so you probably know what you're talking about. So what's wrong, kid?"

She looked at him sheepishly and answered, "I don't think I want to get married to Murdock again."

Now Hannibal was confused, and he tried to think of what the answer behind this might be. "What, because of Amy?"

"Not just her," Jean said, "I've been thinking about the other day when you got shot."

"What about it?" Hannibal asked her.

She looked him dead in the eye as she answered, "Murdock should've been covering you and not worrying about me." She shook her head, "I'm not saying it's his fault you got shot, but he should've made sure you were alright instead of coming to my aid. I said before I wasn't going to come between the Team and I have no intention to, I think it would be better if he and I didn't remarry."

Hannibal laughed and said to her, "Kid, you can't believe that that happened because you two were married before. When there are other people caught in the crossfire, they come first, we're second."

"You don't think it would be worse if we were married again?" Jean inquired.

Hannibal shook his head, "Murdock would've done that even if you two had never been married: because one, you were an innocent bystander caught in the middle of it, two, you're his friend and three, you're a woman, all of that equals a perfectly natural reason why Murdock would try to help you first."

Jean looked like she was having a migraine as she told Hannibal, "I don't want him being responsible for me."

"And why not?" he asked, "You always consider yourself responsible for protecting him."

"That's different," Jean said, "If something happens to me, that's one thing, but if something would happen to Murdock, to any one of you..."

Hannibal shook his head again, "I can think right offhand of six people who would be crushed if anything happened to you: your parents and the four of us."

Jean smiled sadly as she told him, "They haven't seen me in several months, I never remember to call, I'd be surprised if they even remember having me."

"And what about us?" Hannibal asked as he crossed his arms.

"Anything happening to me is nothing compared to if anything happened to you or any of your men," Jean said.

Hannibal smiled at her and said, "I get the feeling that's not the only reason you're having second thoughts. You remember meeting Amy."

Jean nodded, "She seems nice enough to me, and there are plenty more where she came from. If Murdock's going to spend the rest of his life married to someone, then he deserves somebody better than me."

"He doesn't seem to think so," Hannibal said.

"He's just being nice, one of his more endearing qualities," Jean responded, "I don't want him wasting his life on someone like me."

Hannibal shrugged and told her, "It's his choice. And, something I've noticed during this discussion is something that you're not saying, do you know what it is?"

Jean nodded, "I know what you're getting at, and to answer, yes I still love Murdock, I would like to have him stay with me, but what you want and what's best for everyone are always two different things, aren't they, Colonel?"

"Unfortunately for the most part," he conceded, "At least you can be honest about it."

Hannibal saw her body start to sway, starting in her feet and working up her body, and he called her over to the bed and pulled her down on it beside him just before a wave of fatigue threw her completely off balance. She was breathing heavier now and she couldn't keep her eyes open, and Hannibal wasn't in any mood to try walking her down the hall to her own bed. Instead, he grabbed one of the pillows propped against the headboard and put it over his stomach and pulled Jean over so she could lie down with the pillow cushioning her ribs; he knew that by now her body had to be killing her to turn over in a new position for a change. Jean was mumbling something but her mouth was closed and it was all muffled gibberish, Hannibal wrapped an arm around her back and held her close as she slipped into unconsciousness, and a few minutes later he joined her.

"Well now I've seen everything," Face said as he, B.A. and Murdock walked into the kitchen.

"Face, I told you before that I could communicate with any animal when need be," Murdock replied.

"I know, but I never thought I'd see the day you talk a squirrel down from a tree," Face said, "Exactly what did you say to it?"

Murdock shrugged and said, "How should I know? I don't speak squirrel."

"You barely even speak English," B.A. told him, "Just crazy fool, and you getting more fluent in it every day."

"Hey, it worked, didn't it?" Murdock asked, "That squirrel shouldn't ever want to come back around here."

"Why didn't you go with it then?" B.A. asked him.

Murdock hissed like a cat and playfully swung his hand at him like a clawed paw.

"Hey," Face thought of something, "I wonder why Jean didn't stick around to see the results, she was the one that wanted the little bugger gone."

"Maybe she went back to bed," Murdock thought.

"Or," Face hit on a darker thought, "Maybe she had another blackout and cracked her head open on the floor."

The three men looked at each other and tore up the stairs. Murdock reached the master bedroom first and threw the door open and went in; Face and B.A. followed and they found the room empty, so they doubled back and searched the other rooms. B.A. had checked Hannibal's room down the hall and he was still standing in the doorway when Face and Murdock came his way. B.A. turned to them and signaled for them to shut up and he pointed inside the doorway; the lieutenant and the pilot tiptoed over and looked in to see what he found so interesting. They saw Hannibal asleep in the middle of his bed with Jean lying facedown next to him with his arm around her. Both seemed to be sleeping peacefully so the three men quietly backed out of the room, closed the door behind them and headed downstairs to leave the colonel and their honorary corporal alone for the time being.